Playing university football while studying to be a doctor has taught Nick Vanin the values of dedication and sacrifice.

The Catholic Central grad, who capped his gridiron career with a Vanier Cup championship in 2017 while balancing the rigours of first-year medical school, could have played one more season for the Western Mustangs, but he felt it was time to hang up the cleats and concentrate on medicine.

Vanin, 24, will be honoured as a Top 8 Academic All-Canadian by Gov. Gen. Julie Payette in a ceremony at Rideau Hall in Ottawa on Jan. 29, but the Ontario University Athletics all-star linebacker said the people who deserve the real credit are his mom and dad.

Vanin’s parents, Patricia and Carlos, marine biologists who met in school, arrived in London from Cali, Colombia, with their two sons in the week that Nick turned nine years old.

“They had very good professional lives in Colombia,” he said. “When people congratulate me on these awards, I understand the magnitude of them and I’m very proud of them, but it’s very easy to keep it in focus because I always compare it to what my parents did. And to me, I just played football and went to school.”

Vanin says the sacrifices his parents made — leaving the country and culture of their birth without family and friends and learning a new language well into adulthood — are not lost on him or his brother Sebastian, a second-year science student and a fullback with the Mustangs.

“My dad is a nurse and my mom is a dental assistant, both far cries from what they were doing originally,” Vanin said. “As a kid, I don’t think I appreciated it, but I think the older I get, the more and more I realize what they did.”

Thankfully, Canada is “a wonderful country” that offers immigrants opportunities to adapt and succeed, he said.

“Just to imagine what they went through, and at the same time trying to raise two children, who probably weren’t the easiest kids to raise — trying to keep us involved in school, trying to keep us on top of our homework in a language that they weren’t as fully proficient in at that time, to bring us forward to where we are today.”

Vanin said although his parents struggled early on, he can’t remember ever wanting for anything.

“Just using the analogy of food, they would make sure that we’d eat first before they took whatever was left,” he said.

“You see people that are your idols every single day . . . making those sacrifices. Knowing what they went through to get you to this point, who am I not to be the best that I can be?”

Vanin’s mom, dad, brother and girlfriend Mackenzie Wolowich will make the trip to Ottawa later this month for the Rideau Hall ceremony. One male and female athlete from each U Sports conference is selected each year for the Top 8 Academic All-Canadian honour.

Taking away football, which Vanin describes as nearly a full-time job, has given him time to pursue research opportunities and personal interests, such as playing basketball or squash, taking in a Raptors game on TV or simply spending time with friends.

“It just changed the dynamic of every day — not having to go to practice every single day and even in the off-season, not having to go in and train. It frees up quite a bit more time,” he said. “This is going to sound ridiculous, but I haven’t been able to read a book, like recreationally, since probably high school.

“I’m a big Game of Thrones fan, so I got to finish the Game of Thrones series. I got to catch up on a lot of Margaret Atwood books and I just finished reading Middlesex (by Jeffrey Eugenides). A friend recommended it to me, which is also pretty good.”

Vanin, who won the U Sports Russ Jackson Award in 2017 for the player who demonstrates excellence in football, academics and community service, also credits his accomplishments to the love and inspiration he receives from Wolowich.

He volunteers with Women’s Community House and Sexual Assault Centre (now joined as Anova), Ronald McDonald House and Andrew’s Legacy, but he says he particularly enjoys working with the Junior Mustangs and giving back to the coaches and the program that brought him up as a player.

“I had a blast coaching those kids. I was doing it with a staff that was pretty similar to the one we had at Western and coaches that had coached me when I was in high school at CCH,” Vanin said.

“J-P Circelli was the head coach for all of those teams. Adrian Kaiser, who was my linebacker coach at Western, was my defensive co-ordinator for the Junior Mustangs, so I was able to learn a lot with him.”

The skills Vanin developed through coaching and other volunteer pursuits are benefiting him in his medical training.

“Having the skills to communicate very clearly is something that is really helping me and will continue to help me down the road,” he said.

Those abilities, Vanin says, helped him in winning an award for patient-centred clinical methods in first-year medical school. The course teaches medical students the concepts associated with bedside manner, such as how to interview patients and how to effectively conduct physical exams.

Although Vanin has been able to pursue other interests since ending his playing career, he still found time to watch last season’s Mustangs, which made it back to the Vanier Cup championship game, but lost 34-20 to the Laval Rouge et Or in Quebec City.

“I followed them religiously,” he said. “A lot of my good friends are still on the team. My brother is still on the team.”

Western Mustang linebacker Nick Vanin. (File photo)

He said it was tough to watch from the sidelines, especially the first few games.

“You see plays going on and you see what they are doing and . . . you feel a little bit helpless because it’s out of your power, but the boys did a good job.”

He said if someone had told him he was going to finish his university football career winning a Vanier Cup, 39-17 over the Rouge et Or, he would have thought that was too good to be true.

“I would have said that’s awesome. Sounds good, a fairy tale ending,” he said. “I could never ask for something better. We get to win a national championship with my best friends in Hamilton. It was very close to London and a lot of my friends and family were there. It was the best possible scenario.”

Vanin says he hasn’t ruled out any specialties in medicine, but is leaning toward becoming a surgeon.

He said he is thankful he was able to get through his football career relatively unscathed, but added the risk of head injuries was something he couldn’t ignore.

“It is a contact sport and there are risks associated with it,” he said. “I think I was always very true to myself and I understood when I needed to bring symptoms to the attention of coaches and trainers. For example, if I thought I had a concussion, I would walk off the field, and say ‘I think I’m concussed,’ and go through the protocol.”

The future physician was more circumspect when asked if he would be OK with his kids playing football.

“When that time comes and if my children ask to play football, we will have that conversation about the risks and the benefits of it,” he said. “I didn’t start playing football until Grade 9 and maybe I don’t see the need for a child to play football (before that), but a lot of people do. . . . I think it’s a bridge I’ll have to cross when I get there.”

Vanin added, with a laugh, that he plans to offer his future family endless options when it comes to athletics.

“I have a master plan for my children to go into every sport to maximize their athletic potential, so maybe they won’t even like football.”